“Motion Control Needs To Be Kept Separate From Main Experience” – Levine

Irrational Games creative director and BioShock creator, Ken Levine recently shared some very interesting opinions on motion control. Levine believes that motion control is not a bad thing but should not get in the way of the core gaming experience.

Levine encourages experimentation with the current generation of motion control technology but is concerned for the preservation of tried and tested gameplay mechanics which may get lost or altered for the worst if everyone starts trying to build their game around motion control support.

“Any experience that sits in the realm of motion play needs to be kept separate from the main experience,” he told OXM in an E3 interview.

“It needs to be firewalled off so that if this experiment isn’t for you, or doesn’t turn out to be all that great, you just ignore it. Any new experience we add, we need to be able to protect this experience.”

Referring to BioWare’s showcase at E3, the Bioshock creator said, “I like the stuff they’re doing with Mass Effect 3, in terms of making some of the interface aspects a little less thorny – more the squad commands than the conversation, as that’s a bit of a challenge on the controller.”

“What you don’t want to do is add something in and enforce it on anybody,” he concluded. “Do an experiment, fine! We’re in the experimental stage, and people shouldn’t be afraid of experimenting as long as we can firewall off and protect what we know works. If we don’t experiment, we don’t progress.”

Levine is currently working on BioShock: Infinite which does look to be the successor to BioShock that BioShock 2 should have been. Infinite is due to release next year on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3.

Totally agree with Levine’s point of not forcing peeps to use motion-controllers if it isn’t to their liking. Obviously some companies will implement motion-controls better than others, and being forced to re-do certain levels only because of frustrating controls is not the way forward!